But as the verdict was delivered, he stared gloomily ahead and tensions quickly boiled over in the cramped, crowded courtroom.

Members of Azaria’s family clapped sarcastically as the decision was delivered, some screaming “Our hero!”

A female relative was kicked out of the courtroom for screaming at the judges and calling the decision a disgrace.

A second woman stormed out, shouting: “Disgusting leftists.”

Hundreds of the soldier’s supporters, many of them young religious men wearing skullcaps, gathered outside the military court in Tel Aviv ahead of the verdict.

While the verdict was being read, some demonstrators chanted a death threat against the Israeli army’s chief, Lt Gadi Eizenkot, insinuating he would face the same fate as Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin, assassinated 20 years ago by an ultranationalist Israeli.

“Gadi, Gadi, watch out. Rabin is looking for a friend,” the demonstrators chanted.

The crowd was quickly dispersed without any further violence.

The shooting occurred at the height of what has become more than a year-long wave of Israeli-Palestinian violence.

Miri Regev, a popular cabinet minister from Mr Netanyahu’s Likud Party and a former military spokeswoman, immediately called for Azaria to be pardoned.

In Hebron, the killed Palestinian attacker’s father welcomed the decision.

“I feel good. It is fair. This is an achievement of the court that it condemned the soldier,” said Yousri al-Sharif.